whiptail

1 For the all-female whiptail lizard, the solution is to hedge its bets.

2 One species of whiptail lizard, for example, has only females.

3 At one of the traps, as Rachael reaches in to remove a whiptail lizard, it runs up her arm and away.

4 The North American whiptail lizards (Aspidoscelis) are grandmasters at it.

5 These findings led scientists to a hypothesis for how these strange species came about: Sometimes individuals from two different species of whiptail lizards interbreed, and their hybrid offspring carry two different sets of chromosomes.

6 Now, whiptail lizards aren't the only animals who can clone themselves.

7 Species such as the Blainville’s horned lizard and the whiptail lizard live on high ridgelines on the western side of the park.

8 Another lizard species, the Central American whiptail, has been observed offering a potential partner a lovely dead frog to eat before mating.

9 New Mexico whiptails actually represent a remarable evolutionary feat: Their lineage came about via the union of two separate species, the little striped whiptail and the western whiptail.

10 Some of the most striking examples occur among whiptail lizards, which live in the southwestern United States.

11 But parthenogenic female whiptail lizards can duplicate the chromosomes in their offspring without males.

12 They ran the idea past Charles J. Cole, a herpetologist at the American Museum of Natural History, who has studied whiptail lizards since the 1960s.

13 Among the finds were 124 species and eight subspecies believed to be new to science, like the spiny rat, whiptail lizard and orchid below.

14 Many species of whiptail lizards are all female.

15 Some species of whiptail lizards carry three sets of genes, rather than two.

16 And in the long run, whiptail lizards won't get a chance to evolve into a stronger species.

17 But David Hillis, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Texas, questioned whether any lineage of hybrid whiptail lizards should be considered true species.

18 These include unisexual whiptail lizards and deadbeat cassowary moms, which abandon hatchlings to Dad’s care.

19 Matthew Fujita, a UTA biology professor and the center’s curator of herpetology, uses the collection to study parthenogenesis, a wacky way that certain female whiptail lizards reproduce by cloning themselves.

20 But whiptail lizards couldn't care less about those silly biological rules.

1 健肢蜥

racerunner

2 美洲蜥蜴科

tegu

3 长尾鳕

rattail

4 鞭尾蜥蜴

racerunner